Automate Seek-to-Time Function Using Javascript/ Custom Button?

[Willielk]

Dear Adobe Community,

Thank you in advance for any help or ideas you might have on this question.

My client and his team shoot a lot of video and make a lot of PDF reports based on those videos.

My client seeks to have a fillable form created in which he can easily add an MP4 (h.264) file to the PDF document and then reference that file several times throughout, incorporating the "Seek-to-Time" function, (or some other JavaScript solution involving the StartAt/ EndAt functions, etc.) to bring up the highlights. 

This would allow his field crew inspectors to document their findings, place the video they are recording alongside their notes, and the end-users of such documents would be able to jump right to the points of interest in the video (as each instance would seek to different starting points along the timeline of the same embedded video file). 

In an ideal world, the inspector documenting the findings via PDF would be able to use a button or other simple function to add the video file, which would then  prompt to enter the offset/ StartAt time, so that they don't spend too much time fishing around in the background dialog boxes for such functions.  Is there a relatively straightforward way to do this in either the Acrobat DC, XI, or X environment?

Again, any thoughts would be greatly appreciated.  Thank you.

[JoelGeraci_Datalogics · Accepted solution]

For the use case you describe, you don't need JavaScript at all. With the movie embedded in the PDF, just open the Comments panel and scrub to the point of interest in the video with the video paused, add a comment on the frame and save the file. You can even use  the circle annotation, the pen, or the callout to show the specific area of the frame that needs attention.

Then when the comment is selected from the comment panel, the video will jump to the time that the comment was added.

J- 

[Willielk]

Joel,

Thank you, sir!  I really appreciate your quick response.  My apologies for my delayed follow-up.  I see what you mean!  Looks like I can embed and then scrub to the time in the video I want to note and simply make an annotation.  Seems pretty doable for the guys I will be training on this.  Final question, any chance there is a way to make the annotation only play for 20 seconds or so?  The whole idea is for it to be a highlight, not necessarily show the entire video.  I supposed I could have them screen capture the 20 seconds in question and simply link to that file, but was just wondering if there was a way acrobat might be able to do it instead.  Thank you so much again for your help!  Really appreciate it!

[JoelGeraci_Datalogics]

With the default player, no. However, a customized player would be able to, you'd just need to add the appropriate callbacks to pause the video 20 seconds after it started playing from a point that corresponded to the selected annotation. Only the document creators would need to replace the default video player with the custom one since the player gets embedded in the PDF when you add the video.

J-

[Willielk]

Joel,

Thank you, sir.  That sounds great.  Are there any customized/ 3rd party players you would recommend?  I remember, once upon a time, Video Player Plus was an option for Acrobat folks.  Not sure if anything like that exists for Acrobat in its current form.  Will look around, as well.  Thank you again, sir.

Matt

[JoelGeraci_Datalogics]

Matt:

There's this... UVSAR : VideoPlayerX for Adobe Acrobat Pro

I don't think it does exactly what you want but Dave is a really smart guy and may be willing to do the customization. If not, contact me directly and I can probably help you out; I wrote the Video Player Plus.

[Willielk]

Joel,

Nice!  Thank you, sir.  I will follow-up on that link and see what Dave has to say.  And it's great to know that you might be willing to work with my client and I, as well.  We have some other javascript document customization questions for you that, depending on your thoughts and schedule, would love to hire for.  Is that something we might be able to discuss further at some point?  Is there a better way to contact you instead of this thread?  My email address is filmtheworldproductions@gmail.com, if that helps.  My name, again, is Matt Hill.

Thank you, sir.

P.S. - Video Player Plus was awesome, by the way. Used it on projects for other clients, back in the day.  Much respect.

[Willielk]

Please note, my last comment regarding Video Player Plus was simply to indicate that your gift to the Acrobat community has made many people happy.  Beyond billing for my time to implement the player in said projects, no monetary exchanges were made between myself, my clients, or the end-users of said projects.  Just want to make it very clear that we did not, at any time, violate the terms and conditions of your license and sincerely appreciate the great work you do for our community.  Thank you, sir.